LOVELORN

16|Truths & Games

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AVI CALLED Zora. Were they friends or...? No. I knew they'd talked before but I never thought they were close enough to be calling each other. Maybe Zora hadn't been lying and he was just calling to check up on me. But I'd heard her tone. It felt odd, like she was hiding something from me.

I'd been trying not to overthink it, but convincing my brain to not overthink something made it do the opposite. It was impossible. My mind had a tendency to latch onto the smaller things. Feed them with doubt until they grew bigger, occupying a larger space in my head than they were worth.

The selfish, ugly part of me couldn't help but think that Avi had everything and yet he couldn't let this one person just be mine. I knew Zora didn't belong to anyone, she certainly wasn't mine, but whenever I felt like I would never be enough for someone to just like me for me, without my brother interfering, Zora made me feel like that wasn't true. So, in some childish sense, the idea of her being friends with Avi felt like betrayal. It was stupid and insecure, but I couldn't help it.

"Naya?" Zora asked. It was the week after Thanksgiving and we were back in school.

"Hmm?" I hummed, not having heard what she'd said.

"I asked if you were up for a sleepover on Friday with the others. It'd be at my place."

"Oh, yeah. Of course. Sounds fun."

Zora nodded and turned back to the others. My eyes landed on Mai. She was acting like she used to, on the outside at least. But all her words felt like an act and all her smiles seemed forced. It was obvious from the perspective of someone who knew what it was like to constantly fake them.

There was a certain hollowness to everything she did. Like it was a performance put on so people wouldn't question her bad mood. When she thought no one was looking, she dropped the smiles and picked at her food with the fork. She hadn't eaten anything, instead had simply pushed it around her plate, distracting everyone with her cheeriness so they wouldn't question it. I knew Caio noticed it, but I wasn't sure if the others did.

After school, I went to talk to Mai. It was less so planned than it was an impromptu decision made upon spotting her walking to her car.

"Hey, Mai!" I called out, doing a little awkward jog toward her. Existing is humiliating.

Her eyes landed on me. She took out her earphones and faced me. I stopped in front of her and saw how she immediately plastered on a smile. All lips and no eyes in it. A smile meant to please.

"Hi, Naya. What's up?"

Now that I was there, I wasn't sure what to say. I couldn't exactly ask her to confess all her deepest, darkest secrets and explain what was going on with her.

"You up for doing something?"

If you weren't looking you wouldn't have seen it, but I spotted her smile faltering slightly. It was quite obvious she wasn't in the mood to hang out.

"Oh, I don't know, Naya. I have a lot of homework to do. Some other day maybe?"

"Uhm, yeah. Sure, of course. Just thought I'd ask in case you were available."